XAVIER CORTADA'S PUBLIC ART
Over the past three decades, Cortada has created art across six continents including more than one hundred and fifty (150) public artworks and dozens of collaborative murals and socially engaged projects. Cortada’s work aims to address our relationship to place, to each other, and the natural world. He has developed innovative art solutions to public art-making that explore our ability to coexist with nature.
Cortada’s site-specific public art range from free-standing and suspended sculpture, fountains, plazas, ceramic tile murals, mosaics, paintings, and large-scale digital works. His Florida public art commissions include works at Port Everglades, the Frost Art Museum, the Florida Turnpike, Florida Botanical Gardens, Curtis Park, and at ten Miami-Dade Housing Authority sites.
Cortada’s work is in the permanent collections of museums across the nation, such as Peréz Art Museum Miami, the Whatcom Museum, and the Frost Art Museum. In Florida, his works permanently hang at the entrances of the Museum of Florida History, the State of Florida Department of State, the commission chambers of the City of Miami, the Upper Keys Government Center, the Village of Pinecrest and Miami-Dade County Hall.
He has also been selected for juried artist pools for public art programs in Seattle, El Paso, Iowa, Los Angeles, Broward County, and Ocala, FL.
PUBLIC ART COMMISSIONS
2024 Floral River, Transit Center and Parking Garage, Frankfort, KY
2024 Water Columns, Beach Drive and 2nd Street, Jacksonville Beach, FL
2024 In Gear, Fire Rescue Station 49, Palm Beach County, FL
2023 Reverence, Joy, Love | Resilience, Strength, McKee Botanical Garden Vero Beach, FL
2023 Shoal, Deerfield Beach Promenade, Deerfield Beach, FL
2023 Liberty Square: Native Flora – Mangroves & Wildflowers, Liberty Square, Miami Dade Art in Public Places, Miami, FL
2021 Liberty Square: Grounded, Liberty Square, Miami, FL
2021 Flower Force, Village of Palmetto Bay Art in Public Places, Palmetto Bay, FL
2020 Heron and Ibises, Village Hall, Village of Palmetto Bay, FL
2020 El Manglar and Miami Mangrove Forest (redux), Palmetto Bay Art in Public Places, Palmetto Bay, FL
2019 Pinecrest Mangrove Forest, Pinecrest Gardens, Pinecrest, FL
2019 A Pelican’s Path, Fine Plaza, Miami-Dade Housing Authority, Miami, FL
2018 Four Seasons: Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter, University of Miami Miami Business School, Coral Gables, FL
2018 Marcia Gardens Mangroves, Marcia Gardens, Miami-Dade Housing Authority, Miami, FL
2018 Diatom Court, Pinecrest Gardens, Pinecrest, FL
2017 Longitudinal Installation, Pinecrest Gardens, Pinecrest, FL
2017 Diatom Fountain, Smathers Plaza, Miami-Dade Housing Authority, Miami, FL
2016 Diatom Mural, Jack Orr Plaza, Miami-Dade Housing Authority, Miami, FL
2016 Sunburst Woodstorks, Stirrup Plaza 2, Miami-Dade Housing Authority, Miami, FL
2015 Florida is… Florida Panthers, Ft. Drum Plaza, (Florida Department of Transportation), Okeechobee, FL
2015 Florida is… Wildflowers | Seed bombs, West Palm Beach Plaza, (Florida Department of Transportation), West Palm Beach, FL
2015 Sunrise & Sunset, Turkey Lake Plaza, (Florida Department of Transportation), Orlando, FL
2015 (Rededication/Replica of 1999 mosaic:) Commemorating 100 Years of Juvenile Justice, Miami-Dade Children’s Courthouse, Miami-Dade Art in Public Places, Miami, FL
2015 Just Below the Surface: 1915 (Founding of Miami Beach), Florida Coastal Everglades Long-Term Ecological Research, Miami Beach, FL
2014 Wading Birds and Heron, Stirrup Plaza 1, Miami-Dade Housing Authority, Miami, FL
2014 Las Libelulas, Dragonflies on Blue, and Los Caballitos del Diablo, Pineiro Apartments, Miami-Dade Housing Authority, Miami, FL
2014 Julia’s Blossoms, Flor, Orange Blossoms, and 500, Collins Park Apartments, Miami-Dade Housing Authority, Miami, FL
2014 Pelican Path, Port Everglades Terminal 4, Broward County Public Art and Design Program, Ft. Lauderdale, FL
2013 Starfish Shuffle: Digital Tapestry, Current, Sandbar, Sand, Seashore, Seagrass 1, Seagrass 2, Port Everglades Terminal 2, Broward County Public Art and Design Program, Ft. Lauderdale, FL
2013 Flight of the Ibis, University of Miami Activities Center, Coral Gables, FL
2013 Mangrove Cove, Seedlings, Mangroves (On Blue), Raices, Entangled, and Roots, Dante Fascell Apartments, Miami-Dade Housing Authority, Miami, FL
2013 Sawfish, Horseshoe Crab March, Sea Star Light, Sea Stars, Night Swimming, and Octopus, South Miami Plaza, Miami-Dade Housing Authority, Miami, FL
2013 Flores de Cocuyos, Baile de las Mariposas, and Odonata, Joe Moretti Apartments, Miami-Dade Housing Authority, Miami, FL
2012 Splash!, Miami Gardens Aquatic Center, Miami-Dade Art in Public Places, Miami Gardens, FL
2009 Native Canopy, Murray E. Nelson Government and Cultural Center, Key Largo, FL
2008 Four Elements (at the Frost), Patricia and Phillip Frost Art Museum, State of Florida Art in State Buildings Program, Tallahassee, FL
2008 Plaza Allapattah, Plaza Roja, Plaza Azul, and Plaza Amarilla, Curtis Park, Miami, FL
2007 Conquistadores and Raices, State of Florida Department of State, Tallahassee, FL
2007 18 Mile Stretch, Monroe County Art in Public Places North Key Largo Fire Station, Key Largo, FL
2005 First Encounter: 1566 and The Incorporators: 1896, City of Miami City Hall, Miami, FL
2004 Our Community (is like a Mangrove Forest), Miami-Dade County Hall, Foyer to Commission Chambers, Miami,
2004 Miami Mangrove Forest, metaphoric reforestation of mangrove forest across underpasses of I-95 throughout City of Miami
2003 Dreaming of a World Free of Poverty, The World Bank, Washington, D.C.
2003 The Journey & Florida Mangrove, Museum of Natural History, Department of State, Tallahassee, FL
2002 Stepping into the American Dream the official mural of the White House Conference on Minority Homeownership, Washington, D.C.
2001 Convictim, collaborative art mural with the participation of juvenile offenders, Office of the Public Defender, 11th Judicial Circuit of Florida, Miami-Dade County Art in Public Places, Miami, FL
1999 Commemorating 100 Years of Juvenile Justice, Miami-Dade Juvenile Courthouse, Miami, FL (Replicated in new courthouse in 2015, Miami-Dade Art in Public Places)Water
